News & Current EventsDiscuss U.S. to ban use of Kaspersky software in federal agencies at the General Forum; Why I ask would our govt., consider using any foreign software on our Nations secure networks, Call this (for time ...

Why I ask would our govt., consider using any foreign software on our Nations secure networks, Call this (for time of notice) Equifax Boner # 2..

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U.S. to ban use of Kaspersky software in federal agencies amid concerns of Russian espionage

by Ellen Nakashima & Jack Gillum, Washington Post, 13 Sept. 2017

The U.S. government on Wednesday banned the use of a Russian brand of security software by federal agencies amid concerns the company has ties to state-sponsored cyberespionage activities, according to U.S. officials.

Acting Homeland Security secretary Elaine Duke ordered that Kaspersky Lab software be barred from federal government networks, giving agencies a timeline to get rid of it, according to several officials familiar with the plan who were not authorized to speak publicly about it. Duke ordered the scrub on the grounds that the company has connections to the Russian government and its software poses a security risk.

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The directive comes months after the federal General Services Administration, the agency in charge of government purchasing, removed Kaspersky from its list of approved vendors. In doing so, the GSA suggested a vulnerability exists in Kaspersky that could give the Kremlin backdoor access to the systems the company protects.

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Just a guess, but maybe the Obama administration wanted glasnost with the Russians.

Sure Obama was a progressive, I'll buy that. Yet go back to the JFK admin., months before the assassination, Jack wanted to join our two countries in the space program.
Russia wasn't having none of it. As were people of power here, it seems.

Well what did our intel services have on Russia Putin. Well he was devious deadly to some.
His goal of having Russia in a Leadership role (as China seeks) Why deal with him when they know Russia would get more intel from us than we from them.

Economically speaking it has drained off some of our profits. And advanced theirs.
One doesn't win when dealing with Putin.

Kaspersky smoking gun found on US systems...About 15 Percent of US Federal Agencies Detected Kaspersky on NetworksNovember 14, 2017 - About 15 percent of U.S. federal agencies have reported some trace of Moscow-based Kaspersky Lab software on their systems, a Department of Homeland Security (DHS) official told Congress on Tuesday.

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Jeanette Manfra, assistant secretary for cybersecurity at DHS, told a U.S. House of Representatives panel that 94 percent of agencies had responded to a directive ordering them to survey their networks to identify any use of Kaspersky Lab products.

Eugene Kaspersky, Chief Executive of Russia's Kaspersky Lab, speaks during an interview with Reuters in Moscow

The Trump administration in September ordered civilian U.S. agencies to remove Kaspersky Lab from their networks, saying it was concerned the Moscow-based cybersecurity firm was vulnerable to Kremlin influence and that using its anti-virus software could jeopardize national security.

'I don't know how to explain it - I looked down an' poof, there it was in my hand'...Kaspersky says it obtained NSA files -- but not deliberateNov. 16, 2017 -- Kaspersky Lab, the Russian-headquartered anti-virus company, confirmed Wednesday it extracted sensitive files from a U.S. National Security Agency worker's computer, but said it wasn't a deliberate move.

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The company conducted its own investigation after The Wall Street Journal on Oct. 5 reported Russian hackers spied on the U.S. government using Kaspersky software to find and steal classified files on the NSA contractor's home computer. "Given that Kaspersky Lab has been at the forefront of fighting cyberespionage and cybercriminal activities on the Internet for over 20 years now, these allegations were treated very seriously," Kaspersky said in its 13-page report. "To assist any independent investigators and all the people who have been asking us questions whether those allegations were true, we decided to conduct an internal investigation to attempt to answer a few questions we had related to the article and some others."

Kaspersky says a poorly secured PC with a pirated version of Microsoft Office sent NSA files to its servers from Sept. 11 to Nov. 9, 2014, from a Verizon FiOS address pool for the Baltimore, Md., area. The servers downloaded the files after the antivirus software flagged them for containing malicious code. "The reason we deleted those files and will delete similar ones in the future is two-fold," Kaspersky Lab officials wrote in Thursday's report. "We don't need anything other than malware binaries to improve protection of our customers and secondly, because of concerns regarding the handling of potential classified materials. Assuming that the markings were real, such information cannot and will not [be] consumed even to produce detection signatures based on descriptions."

The Russian cyber security firm Kaspersky Lab confirmed it extracted sensitive files from a U.S. National Security Agency worker's computer, but said it wasn't deliberate.

Eugene Kaspersky, the company's founder and chief executive, ordered the classified data deleted from the company's systems. Kaspersky said "we also found no indication the information ever left our corporate networks," including Russian spies. Five days after the Wall Street Journal findings, The New York Times reported that Israel alerted the United States that Kaspersky software was being used for espionage. Kaspersky said the only third-party intrusion in its networks was by Duqu 2.0 -- malware linked to Israeli intelligence.

U.S. federal agencies have now been told to remove all Kaspersky software from their computers. "It is appalling to see that accusations against our company continue to appear without any proof or factual information being presented," Kaspersky said in the report. "Rumors, anonymous sources, and lack of hard evidence spreads only fear, uncertainty and doubt. We hope that this report sheds some long-overdue light to the public and allows people to draw their own conclusions based on the facts presented above. We are also open and willing to do more, should that be required."